“Oh what a tangled web we weave. When first we practice to deceive”. Sir Walter Scott’s comment could have been made about the LIBOR and foreign exchange (forex) scandals engulfing the world’s largest…

The past three decades have seen an unprecedented explosion of activity in a new sub-discipline of mathematics: financial mathematics. The emergence of this field has parallelled the expansion of the quantitative…

The revelation on the BBC and in the Guardian that British bank, HSBC, the second biggest in the world has allegedly helped UK residents sidestep taxes through a Swiss subsidiary should really come as…

In survey after survey bankers rank poorly on ethics and honesty. It’s not hard to find entire websites dedicated to bank hatred. And Bank of America consistently rates in the top 10 most hated companies…

Peer-to-peer lending, the online platforms which allow you and I to lend directly to people and businesses who want to borrow, has been hailed as disruptive technology. Cheered by savers who have been…

It came as no great surprise when David Thorburn announced this week that he was stepping down as chief executive of the troubled Clydesdale and Yorkshire banks. Having joined Clydesdale in the 1970s as…

Think whistleblowing is a matter of telling the truth? Think again. “Successful” whistleblowing, where the protagonist actually manages to make themselves heard in the media and get the support of the…

A key component of the Financial System Inquiry handed to Treasurer Joe Hockey this week was that “the financial system should be subject and responsive to market forces, including competition”. But on…

The collapse of Lehman Brothers was a pivotal moment in the most recent financial crisis. The next crash may feature another bank failure.
ReutersDecember 1 2014

The subprime crisis and the subsequent failure of Lehman Brothers came as such a shock – and the repercussions were so severe that when the time came to mount a response, policy makers were as surprised…

Debenhams: one of several quoted companies on the private equity merry-go-round.
Karen RoeDecember 1 2014

There is an ongoing and very heated debate between the unconditional supporters of private equity and their opponents. It’s not hard to see why. On the surface, these investors can often buy fragile companies…

The UK has given up on challenging the European Court of Justice over its cap on banker bonuses. The cap that’s in place restricts bonuses to 100% of banker’s pay or 200% with shareholder approval. And…

There is something in the culture of banking that lends itself toward making otherwise fairly good people do bad things. That’s the finding of a new study published in the journal, Nature. And it may simply…

Small beer? Bank fines and the culture they punish.
Steve JamesNovember 16 2014

The biggest open secret in the financial world has been confirmed. Regulators in the UK, the US and Switzerland have announced massive fines for some of the world’s largest banks for a manipulation of…

Any banking system reforms must target all institutions.
AAPNovember 6 2014

Banks borrow short and lend long. So if all of a bank’s depositors suddenly want their money, the bank would be unable to pay them. A bank may have made great loans but it can only unwind these loans slowly…

Saudi Arabia’s largest lender, National Commercial Bank (NCB) has attracted 215.8 billion riyals (US$58 billion) of bids from about 1.2m investors following its initial public offering. Despite attracting…

China’s decision to establish an Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) may prove to be one of the most important regional initiatives in recent history. At the very least it is yet another revealing…

The results of the long-awaited European Banking Association (EBA) “stress tests” show that 25 banks were found wanting. Altogether, the banks were about €25 billion short of the capital required to be…